Using Ground Source Heat Pumps for Power
Ground source heat pumps provide a comparatively inexpensive and environmentally friendly method to use spare heat from the ground for heating and cooling both housing and business properties. Early set-up prices can be a reasonable amount higher than regular air-source systems, but geothermal heat pumps present significantly lower ownership costs over the long run. Ground source heat pumps (GSHPs) are units that utilize the earth?s heat to provide heating, cooling and hot water for commercial institutions and housing establishments. The systems are designed to take advantage of the fact that temperatures stay at a near constant level of between 7 C and 21 C just a couple of feet beneath the ground, regardless of geographic area or surface air temperatures. Throughout winter, the systems essentially extract heat from the ground and transfer it to a commercial building or house, whilst in summer the systems extract heat from building interiors and move it to the ground. Ground source heat pumps are electrically run and are sometimes referred to as geothermal heat pumps, or geo-exchange pumps, or merely as earth-coupled heat pumps. A full-fledged GSHP unit consists of a heat pump, a ground loop system for absorbing heat from the ground or rejecting it back to the earth, and air ducts or radiant floor systems for giving the hot or cold air. The ground loop system typically is made up of numerous loops of plastic tubing filled up with antifreeze liquid or water, buried underground in horizontal or vertical way. Through winter, the liquid in the loops gathers heat from the ground and pushes it to the heat pump where a compressor lifts the temperature even more before circulating it through the building. The stream of the liquid inside the loops is reversed in the course of summer. This results in the warmer air being drawn out from the building and moved to the earth while cooler liquid is circulated back to the heat pump and then through the building. An open loop system functions in pretty much the same fashion, but in this case the liquid in the loops is usually ejected into the earth. Ground source heat pumps have been utilised since the 1940s and are thought to be a more eco-friendly and cost-efficient option to conventional air-transfer based heating and cooling systems. Studies have found that GSHP systems have heating efficiencies up to 70% higher than conventional systems and cooling efficiencies of nearly 40% above than air-conditioners. The preliminary cost of setting up a geothermal heat pump can be quite high compared to conventional heating and cooling systems. Nevertheless, over the long term the pumps are less expensive to own and to maintain. They also can deliver up to 50% savings on energy usage. In some instances, a geothermal heat pump is installed along with an air-source heat pump as a way to decrease initial installation costs. Discover more information and facts about Ground Source Heat Pumps
